Secrets of a Haruno
by fallenangel44
Summary: A pained expression crosses her ethereal face. She'd lost her daughter. She'd lost her village. There was no way she would lose her life to. And if staying alive meant throwing herself at Sasuke Uchiha, she would do. She would not let Idate win. REVISED


"Guard duty sucks!" Naruto complains. The boisterous blonde immediately takes a step away from his teammates, already feeling the annoyance surging off of them.

"Idiot," Sasuke hisses. "Its for one more hour. How do you expect to the Hokage when you can't even deal with guard duty?"

"For once the bastard's right. Just deal with it, dickless." Sai commands haughtily, thinking his insults humorous. Naruto lets out a feral growl and prepares to lunge at his comrade, when he is hit dead on with the sense of a foreign chakra. The closer it gets, the stronger it becomes.

"Sai, go get back up. Now!" Naruto demands, pulling a kunai out of his holster. He looks directly into Sasuke's blood red eyes and smirks a little. Both boys get into fighting stance.

Out of the forest staggers a girl no older then sixteen. She is petite and curvy, with deathly pale skin. The cherry blossom pink hair that she sports is clumped together with dried blood and mud. It is obvious to the males that this girl had been dressed in a fine silk kimono, before this happened to her, that is. The remnants of the gown are tattered and blood stained. The girl's eyes are perhaps her most haunting feature: emerald green, the purest kind of green either man had ever seen. They are dull now though, drained of life and happiness alike, begging for death.

Clutched to the girl's full chest is a much smaller girl. A brunette, with closed eyes and an unmoving body. The little girl's limbs are dangling unceremoniously, flopping around with the movements of the pinkette.

"Help," the girl whimpers. Her voice is soft, angelic; the very epitome of femininity. She takes a step towards the men, right foot. Left foot. She seems to be concentrating very hard on something, though the look fades when she gets close enough to them. Her eyes fluttered instead to the knives at their sides.

"End it. Please." No hint of being dramatic. This isn't for effect or out of self-pity, this is suicide. The voice, the look, the aura of someone who wants to die. Naruto lets out a shocked cry.

He makes a move towards her, knife thrown on the ground in haste. But the girl simply falls to her knees; she cradles the child and hums a soft lullaby. The blonde takes a step closer, his confused blue orbs searching deeply into her lifeless emerald ones. Thinking it safe, he kneels down, wraps his calloused hand gently, comfortingly around her tinier one. She shrieks and snatches her hand away, nursing it as if his touch had burned her.

Naruto stumbles backwards, misunderstanding her response. He looks franticly for Sasuke, only to find him behind the morbid beauty. His hand darts out, swiftly pushing her pressure point, sending her into the darkness she had sought to evade.

"Bastard!" Naruto cries out. "What'd you do that for?" Sasuke picks the young girl up, places her wordlessly in his teammates arms. He then picks up the pinkette and turns away. Despite not receiving an answer, Naruto runs to catch up with him.

Tsunade bursts through the door of the hospital room, blazing eyes horribly unfitting the soft décor of the room. Coral walls with ornate white trim, shimmering linoleum floor. A wake of gentle things that bear no true testament to the sorrow these rooms contain.

Shizune follows after her mentor. Short hair tousled, eyes frantic. Tonton follows in tow, and Naruto can't help but think that together they form a train of frightened things. The thought makes him laugh a little, despite its lack of humor. The scent of disinfectants must be messing with his brain. Sasuke jabs him in the ribs, drawing his attention to the Kage and her student.

Tsunade is standing at the end of the hospital bed, feet planted so firmly that Naruto wonders if she is worried that she might be carried off by the wind. He watches Tsunade's lips part ever so slightly, as if she is hesitant to say the words out loud. As if that makes them that much more real, something she cannot bear. She says it anyway.

"The Hoshikage, Sakura Haruno." It comes out in a whisper. Tsunade moves to the other side of the bed, where the little girl lies, unmoving. She doesn't look up at the men.

"The Hoshikage's daughter, Mizuki Haruno." A tight voice, coming from a constricted throat. Tsunade turns away, unwilling to meet the curious looks of those around her. Shizune begins to shake, quiet sobs racking her small frame.

"Kakashi. Take Mizuki-chan's body to the mortician. We can't have the funeral until Sakura-chan wakes up, but I don't want her body lying around here." When all else fails, Tsunade resorts to her leadership skills. It is something she knows she's good at. Something she finds comfort in.

The leadership helps at first, but the comfort slowly begins to fade. The things in this room, they are getting to her. Naruto's sorrowful blue eyes. Shizune's quiet sobs. Sasuke's worried hovering. Sakura's battered body. These things, they nag at Tsunade, making it impossible for her to forget, to pretend that it's someone else on the hospital bed. Someone who didn't call her "Mother" and spend lazy summer afternoons with her. Someone who was mean and spiteful and deserved this kind of thing. Someone who wasn't Sakura. But she can't. Can't forget, can't pretend. So all that's left to do is get angry. And that Tsunade does.

The blonde woman slams her fist on a nearby table, shattering the mahogany with her fist. Everyone in the room jumps, even the normally stoic Kakashi and the indifferent Sasuke. Tears flow out of Tsunade's chocolate orbs.

"Damn it!" She cries out. "Damn it. Mizuki, she meant the world to Sakura. What now? What fucking now?" The woman crumbles to the floor, a massive heap of brokenness. In an instant, Kakashi is at her side, helping her stand.

"Tsunade," he mumbles, leading the blonde to a nearby chair," I know this isn't the most appropriate time, but I have to ask. If Mizuki-san was Haruno-sama's daughter, wouldn't she be marked as well?"

Tsunade takes a deep breath, steadies herself. She knows, vaguely, that it is probably killing Kakashi to discuss this matter in front of his students. It is something shielded, and Kakashi appreciates things like those, prefers to keep them like that even. But the questions help her to keep control of herself, and she is grateful to him for sacrificing the secrecy to help her.

"No, she wasn't marked. No one expected her to be. Hell, no one expected Sakura to be. It was a thing not seen in over two thousand years; a bloodline thought to be lost for all of eternity. It just so happens that Sakura got it though. Her family was ecstatic." The older people stop, all three of them communicating silently with their eyes. Secrets pass between them like the flow of water, swift and uninterrupted. They stop however, when a light groan comes from the bed to their right.

Sakura shoots up, defensive, emerald eyes hurriedly scanning the people around her like a true kunochi. Panic dominates her features as she frantically looks from side to side. When she turns to face the Leaf shinobi, bits of her dirty pink bangs fall into her face. With piercing eyes and a fierce scowl present on her face, Sakura asks the one question everyone was hoping she'd forget about:

"Where's Mizuki-chan?"


End file.
